Digital Marian Helper Winter_2016-2017

8 C 7H?7D > ;BF;H Ǚš W INTER 2016-17 ǙšǙcWh_Wd$eh] I n a low-ceilinged, sneaker-scuffed gymnasium where generations of Catholic school children perennially performed Christmas pageants and played dodgeball, Fr. Brian Slezak dims the lights, switches on a projec- tor, and takes his place on a fold-out chair, along with 50-plus of his parishioners. On the screen, a young priest talks about how we’re all called to become great saints. “Saint Thérèse was known as the ‘bold saint,’” the priest on the screen says. “She asked for bold things.” The Lord, he said, desires that we do the same. That’s welcome news for a crowd with some rather bold requests, including the radical reordering of hearts and minds within a 10,419-square-mile diocese planted in the number one “most post-Christian” region in the United States. The greater Albany region of upstate New York holds that ignominious title, tied with San Francisco, based on a survey of Christian identity and practice that was released in 2015 by Barna Group, a polling firm that tracks the role of faith in America. The leader of the Diocese of Albany, Bishop Edward B. Scharfenberger, isn’t about to dispute those findings — and he isn’t about to fall into despair, either. Too much is at stake, and there are too many reasons to be bold. This summer, he invited his entire diocese to conse- crate themselves to the Divine Mercy by the close of the extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy, on Nov. 20. W HERE ’ S G OD ? By Felix Carroll The Consecration Prayer to the Divine Mercy